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ut this is the way I felt, like I didn't belong there. It was<br />
in my mind there that I didn't have no home, that's the way I<br />
felt. So I didn't stay around the reserve very long. Oh, I'd<br />
say maybe a month or a couple of months, like that and I'd go<br />
away. And I always worked out. Well, I just had to, yeah, out<br />
of the reserve. I just had to go out and work. And I'd always<br />
go around, I'd always go far enough away that I wouldn't come<br />
home, like every weekend or every night or anything like that.<br />
I always went up around Sudbury, North Bay, all up through<br />
there in the lumber camps.<br />
And then so that's what we was getting. There was two prices<br />
-- you get $12 a month, and the person who got $16 a month,<br />
well that was for a teamster, for looking after horses. So I<br />
was, you know, even right now I like horses, like that, cattle<br />
and stuff like that. And of course I always went for... I<br />
didn't go for the big wages because it was a job there that<br />
what I like and that's what I took, looking at horses. So I<br />
got my $16 a month then. So if we stayed there, like when we<br />
got up there for two months we'd get our fare paid up from<br />
Peterborough on the train and get paid on the train again<br />
coming home. They'd take that off of our wages, or they<br />
wouldn't take it off our wages, I should say.<br />
Fay: They wouldn't, you got paid extra?<br />
Russell: No. Yeah, we got that trip extra. So then I'd come<br />
home, like to see my mother -- that's about the only one I<br />
cared for was my mother. I had some sisters, half-sisters, and<br />
my brother he was in a different place. And so I'd hang around<br />
the reserve, you know, till after New Year's then I'd go right<br />
back to the same job again, probably go right back to the same<br />
camp again. So if you go back to same camp again, well you got<br />
your way paid up again. So if you stayed there, say right till<br />
three, four months, well that... If you stayed up there just<br />
like two months there you'd only get, like you'd get your fare<br />
back again. So if you stayed up there four months, well you<br />
got that extra -- whatever the train cost to go up there.<br />
You'd get that like double, and besides get your fare paid home<br />
again. That's the way it went. So then I'd come home, that<br />
would be more like in the spring. Then I'd come home to see<br />
mother again. And mother couldn't, like I couldn't stay with<br />
my mother because my step-father didn't like me. I don't know<br />
why, I never done anything out of the way. I'd come home and<br />
give mother some money, you know. She got most of my money,<br />
because we had no place over there to spend it. No, it was way<br />
back in the lumber camp and all they had was just like tobacco.<br />
That's about all they had in there, there was no other stuff<br />
you could buy. So then I'd come home and stay with mother as<br />
much as I can. I couldn't stay up to her place, where she was<br />
living. I just had to like stay around here and there, you<br />
know, my friends. So then I'd come down here to Burleigh after<br />
that, you know. Like in the spring, you know, the work would<br />
be starting to come around again, so I'd come down here to
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